Proteome Analysis Database: online application of InterPro and CluSTr for the functional classification of proteins in whole genomes

The SWISS-PROT group at EBI has developed the Proteome Analysis Database utilising existing resources and providing comparative analysis of the predicted protein coding sequences of the complete genomes of bacteria, archaea and eukaryotes (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/proteome/). The two main projects used, InterPro and CluSTr, give a new perspective on families, domains and sites and cover 31–67% (InterPro statistics) of the proteins from each of the complete genomes. CluSTr covers the three complete eukaryotic genomes and the incomplete human genome data. The Proteome Analysis Database is accompanied by a program that has been designed to carry out InterPro proteome comparisons for any one proteome against any other one or more of the proteomes in the database.

Online tables of contents for books: effect on usage*

Objectives: To explore whether the presence of online tables of contents (TOC) in an online catalog affects circulation (checkouts and inhouse usage). Two major questions were posed: (1) did the presence of online tables of contents for books increase use, and, (2) if it did, what factors might cause the increase?

The effects of practice on the functional anatomy of task performance

The effects of practice on the functional anatomy observed in two different tasks, a verbal and a motor task, are reviewed in this paper. In the first, people practiced a verbal production task, generating an appropriate verb in response to a visually presented noun. Both practiced and unpracticed conditions utilized common regions such as visual and motor cortex. However, there was a set of regions that was affected by practice. Practice produced a shift in activity from left frontal, anterior cingulate, and right cerebellar hemisphere to activity in Sylvian-insular cortex. Similar changes were also observed in the second task, a task in a very different domain, namely the tracing of a maze. Some areas were significantly more activated during initial unskilled performance (right premotor and parietal cortex and left cerebellar hemisphere); a different region (medial frontal cortex, “supplementary motor area”) showed greater activity during skilled performance conditions. Activations were also found in regions that most likely control movement execution irrespective of skill level (e.g., primary motor cortex was related to velocity of movement). One way of interpreting these results is in a “scaffolding-storage” framework. For unskilled, effortful performance, a scaffolding set of regions is used to cope with novel task demands. Following practice, a different set of regions is used, possibly representing storage of particular associations or capabilities that allow for skilled performance. The specific regions used for scaffolding and storage appear to be task dependent.